


Scrambled

by ForgedObsidian



Series: oh, take the long way home [2]
Category: Captain Marvel (2019)
Genre: FLERKEN BABIES, Gen, this is a soft piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-15 18:40:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18675283
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForgedObsidian/pseuds/ForgedObsidian
Summary: The first message Fury sends Carol is . . . unexpected, in a variety of ways.





	Scrambled

It’d been something Carol worked on, during the post-fight, Talos-healing, Skrulls-getting-used-to-open-air downtime at Maria’s. She’d needed a project outside of Fury’s pager, and between talks with Talos and Soren and Maria, the fear of falling out of her rediscovered life for a second time took over her hands and head. Days before departure she was handing over a two rudimentary communications devices to Fury and Maria, telling them how to access the universal clock and what to do when she (inevitably) missed a transmission.

The large comms were fairly simple, using a touch-based navigation to go between various conversations and an image processor for pictures and real-time conversations. She’d made them as simple as she could, to avoid hackers and increase durability. Monica had been excited, near tears to have a way to keep in contact with Arala and her other Skrull friends and her Aunt Carol. Maria got a little misty eyed, too, rubbing at her face when she thought nobody was looking.

After getting Carol’s contact ID, Fury had gone straight to Talos and made sure he could contact the Skrull Commander personally. Talos had laughed and said, “Sure you don’t want me to keep being your boss?”

Fury’d just grinned back and promised to send a lot of pictures of Goose.

But that was two weeks ago, and now Carol and the refitted Kree stealth ship were resting in the orbit of Kurual, a minimally inhabited planet known for its exports of somewhat-durable wood and fancy carvings.

“‘S a nice enough place,” Talos said, stepping next to her and peering out the viewing port. “Too close to the Kree-Xandarian border for my comfort, though.”

“I hear ya.” She sighed and rested her forearms against the banister. “Any word back from Admiral Yora?”

“We’re about another week out from the armada.” He handed her a pumu fruit, biting into his own and swallowing. “We can’t stay here for too long. Just need to let the engines cool.”

“Hmm.”

Just then her comm _binged_ , signaling a new message. She pulled her wrist up and palmed at the controls, fingers too occupied with the fruit. Monica had been talking about an upcoming school field trip - this might be a quick message about how it went.

Instead it was from Fury, the first one he’d sent her. She quirked her mouth around a mouthful of pumu and pulled up the message, nearly spitting the fruit all over the viewing port as it came up.

Attached was an image of a smug-looking Goose, curled up in a flerken-loaf next to what looked like a glowing, radioactive spider web the size of an icecream truck. Tucked away in the iridescent mess of fibers were an uncountable number of eggs as big as Carol’s fist.

The only text said: EGGS??!! THESE ARE DAMN FLERKEN EGGS??!!

Carol choked between her laughter and the fruit, pushing her wrist towards Talos while she tried to swallow the mouthful of pumu. Talos looked over the message and started wheezing, leaning over and resting his open hand on his knee.

The comm pinged with another message from Fury, saying: WHAT DO I DO THERE’S SO MANY

She cackled and gave up on standing, sagging against the hallway and throwing her head back in a full-body laugh. Talos just draped himself onto the sill of the viewport, shoulders bobbing up and down as he tried to get his laughter under control.

She managed to pull herself together enough to send back: WHAT, NOT READY TO BE A DAD?

THAT’S NOT FUNNY DANVERS. THERE’S LIKE SIXTY OF THESE THINGS.

At that Carol palmed away the message and booted up the live feed. Fury picked up seconds later, looking hassled and confused and very, very tired.

“So flerkens lay eggs,” Carol said, trying to keep her face under control.

Fury narrowed his eye and pointed a finger at her. “Shut it, Danvers.”

Talos slid down the wall next to Carol, trying to breathe around his laughter. “You - ha! - Goose laid eggs!” He rubbed a hand down his face, grinning between his fingers. “Bet that was a surprise!”

Somehow Fury managed to glare harder. “Not what I expected to find in the corner of my apartment at two in the morning.”

There’s an offended merowl from somewhere off-screen and Fury looks down. “Yes, Goose, your babies are wonderful and you’re a perfect mama. I’m just . . . surprised, is all.”

“Show us the proud mama,” Carol said, bracing her wrist comm against her knee.

He knelt down and back up, this time with Goose tucked in the crook of his arm. The flerken seemed pleased, whiskers and ears pricked as she gave a slow blink. Fury sighed and rubbed a finger against Goose’s cheek. “I don’t know how to handle this.”

Carol let her head fall against the wall with a _thunk_. Fury seemed genuinely worried, which was an odd realization to have.

Talos finally stopped laughing and crossed his arms over his chest, grinning into the comm screen. “You’re lucky, actually. Some flerken broods have over a hundred and fifty individuals.”

“Oh. Shit. Should I be looking for other . . . nests?”

“Nah, there’s just the one. It’s easier to protect that way.”

“How long until they, uh, hatch?”

Talos shrugged. “Flerkens can hold their eggs for however long they want, until they feel secure enough in their surroundings and food sources to make the nest. They’ll probably hatch in a few days.”

Fury gave a slow blink and sat down, face flabbergasted. Goose crawled up his chest and rubbed her face against his neck. “Okay,” he said, voice sing-songy. “I’m gonna have over sixty flerkens - flerkittens? flerkits? - running around my small, single-bedroom apartment. That’s -” he took a deep breath and his voice nearly broke, “- _fine._ ”

“Oh, c’mon,” Carol said, giving Fury a smile. “They’re gonna be so cute! Little fluffy kitten things! With tentacles!”

“And pocket dimensions in their bellies,” Talos added. “Think of the prime storage space.”

Carol swatted at his shoulder. “Goose’s babies aren’t storage lockers, you jerk.”

“I’m just saying.”

Fury was rubbing at his temples, his eyes clenched closed. Goose seemed concerned, meowing and rubbing her cheek against his jaw. “What do I do with . . . how do I handle this situation?”

Talos shrugged. “Goose’ll probably handle most of the care. Just make sure to keep her well-fed.”

“She already ate my favorite chair. I can’t afford any more casualties.” He looked up, threading his fingers together. “But what about homes? I’m not guessing there’s a space animal shelter or something.”

“For flerkens? No.”

Goose braced herself against Fury’s shoulder and gave a loud meow right into his face. He blinked and sighed. “Was that you saying you have it under control?”

The flerken gave another loud meow and rubbed her forehead against his chin.

* * *

 

Apparently the growth rate for flerkits was completely random on an individual basis, despite them all hatching within eleven hours of each other. Carol got a series of pictures and clips throughout the entire process, images of Goose vigorously licking her children clean, assisted by Fury and a variety of towels. At the end of it, 67 small flerkits were wobbling around Fury’s living room, eyes already open.

By the end of the week, 16 of the kits had doubled in size and were driving Fury crazy. Then, the next day, those 16 were gone. Goose didn’t seem worried, even though Fury spent a solid two hours nearly turning his apartment upside-down and inside-out.

Then, three days later, 9 more flerkits had grown and gone missing.

It took Fury a while to figure out what was going on, and he was lucky enough to catch it on video.

The screen was bouncing as Carol opened the video message. Eventually the camera stilled, focused on the corner of Fury’s apartment that Goose had claimed for her nest. The strange webbing and eggshells had disappeared. Instead, the entire area was covered in blankets and towels and several small plastic toys.

Most of the flerkits were sleeping, tucked into corners and bundled together. Six of them were awake, however, and grown to the size of young cats. Goose was giving each one a through grooming, making sure their fur was fluffy and clean. Then she opened her maw and tentacles shot out.

For a horrifying moment Carol thought Goose was eating her children, but then she looked closer. Goose’s tentacles were calm, not frenzied and writhing like when she swallowed the Tesseract. They were calm and gentle as they slowly wound around her children, petting their ears and scratching their chins.

The flerkits leaned into the touch and opened their own maws, but nothing came out. Instead there was an odd distortion of space around each of their mouths, and then the flerkits blinked away in a ripple of space.

“Goose, what the hell!” Fury yelled, the camera jostling again as he ran over.

When Carol showed Talos the clip, he shuddered when Goose’s tentacles shot out. But then understanding cleared his eyes as the flerkits disappeared.

“My guess?” Talos swiped through another report. “She’s sending them somewhere they’ll be safe, and can grow into their own.”

“How, though?”

“Flerkens have pocket dimensions in their bellies, Carol. They can probably do all sorts of weird things.”

“Okay, that’s fair.”

Goose continued to send her children out into the universe. Two actually went directly to Maria’s home, popping up in one of her open tool boxes. Monica sent everyone excited pictures of her playing with the flerkits, dragging sticks through the dirt for them to chase.

Four flerkits made it onto Talos’ ship, somehow managing to pop up directly in the command chair on the bridge.

A spunky calico immediately attached herself to Arala like it was her personal mission. The little flerkit was constantly jogging behind her charge, batting at Arala’s heels or trying to climb up her legs. Whenever the young flerken tired, Arala would pick her up and carry her like a child, belly up, tucked safely in the crook of her arm. Arala named her new friend Cypress, after a species of tree in Louisiana. Cypress quickly became Arala’s constant companion, sleeping with her during night cycles and sneaking food off her plate with paws and the occasional tentacle.

Another one - a light orange tabby - made himself at home in the infirmary. He looked like a mirror image of his mother, except for black socks on his feet. The (unimaginative, in Carol’s opinion) staff named him Suture. It wasn’t uncommon for ill or injured crew to be comforted by a facefull of purring flerken. When he wasn’t acting as a destressor, Suture took to napping on bundles of bandages or strutting the hallways with his siblings.

The third was a shy orange-and-black tortoiseshell that tended to avoid crowds. Even as a young flerkit she tended towards the quieter parts of the ship, the information bays, abandoned rooms and closets. Carol named her Ghost. The growing flerken spent a lot of time out and about during night cycles, hunting orloni in the vents and keeping the less boisterous members of the crew company.

The last one was a fuzzy disaster, with ear tufts as long as his head and large, ungainly paws that signaled a lot of growth in his future. Talos named him “Ojir,” using the Old Skrullic word for “join.” Ojir carried himself with dignity, in contrast with the loud Cypress or attention-seeking Suture. The swiftly-growing flerkit enjoyed spending time with Talos and Soren, and it wasn’t uncommon for him to join Carol in the engineering bays as she tinkered with tech and helped repair ships.

Fury nearly passed out from laughter when he heard about four of Goose’s children popping up in Talos’ chair. “For someone so scared of them,” Fury said, chortling as he tried to talk, “they sure seem to like you!”

Talos just flipped him off.

It was surprisingly nice, having the growing flerkens around. The orloni population took a drastic hit, helping protect delicate wiring in the ship’s interior. Suture became a quick favorite of the soldiers, always willing to be held and petted. While he might not admit it, Talos felt better for having a flerken with his daughter - the creatures seemed to protect those they claimed as their own. Ghost lived up to her name, darting around hallways and through rooms she felt uncomfortable in.

Carol sighed and stretched, pulling away from the bundle of wires and metal scraps on the table in front of her. Her personal room was nearly perfect. Her bed was pushed into an alcove, with storage space below. A built-in, slightly magnetized table was ideal for her projects, and the window was wide enough that, if she pressed her face tight to the glass, she just saw space.

There was a polite knock at her door. “Come in,” she called, looking at the smears of black on her fingertips.

The door hissed into the wall and Talos stepped over the threshold. “And how is Captain Marvel today?” he asked, sitting down in a spare chair.

“Mar- _Vell_ ,” she said automatically, a smile pulling at her face. “Just fine.”

“Sleep shift not treating you badly?”

“You know, it takes me a while to get tired, so no.”

“Good, good.” He sighed and rubbed the back of his head. “I just finished a check-in with Admiral Yora.”

Her eyes flicked to his face. “And? What did she say?”

“Well, I think she might have laughed a little when I told her about the flerkits.” His mouth twitched around a smile. “She’s looking forward to meeting you.”

“Oh.”

Talos narrowed his eyes, taking in Carol’s expression. She seemed nervous and . . . guilty. “You alright?”

“Yeah, just, _heh_ , nervous.” She swallowed.

He rested a hand on her shoulder. “She’ll understand, Carol. She might be older than dirt - don’t ever tell her I said that - but she’s a soldier, too. She gets it.”

Carol sighed. “If you say so.”

Just then there was a rattle in the vent above them, a moment of silence, then the grated opening gave way and dumped a solid 15 lbs. of growing, fluffy flerkit onto her work table. Her tools and projects scattered, the slight magnetization not enough to hold them in place. For what it was worth, Ojir seemed just as surprised as everyone else.

Carol sputtered and grabbed the scrabbling flerken, helping him find his feet on the slippery surface. Ojir stilled and let himself relax into a sit, holding himself with a dignity that’d been missing seconds before.

“You,” Carol said, gently booping him on the nose, “are getting too heavy for the vents.” Ojir blinked and gave his head a shake, the tufts on his ears slapping back and forth.

Talos snorted and reached over to give the flerkit a pet down his back. “He’s been too big for a while.”

She leaned forward and gave the flerkit a stern look. “Just what were you thinking, mister?”

Ojir narrowed his yellow eyes and, slowly, reached one paw out and gently bopped Carol on the forehead. She blinked and laughed, letting herself feel how silly everything was. She heard Talos give a soft laugh, and for a moment, everything was alright.

**Author's Note:**

> I pulled some info on flerkens directly from the wiki, but a lot of it I just made up as I went along. Goose is a good mama. Ojir is a Big Fluffy Boy (think bigass maine coon) who likes to feel in charge. Suture loves all his people and actually enjoys belly rubs. Ghost likes hanging out in vents and leaving trophies outside of everyone’s personal rooms. Arala really IS Cypress’s personal charge and she follows her around EVERYWHERE.
> 
> Thank you for reading!


End file.
